EA Sees The End Of Retail

According EA Sports vice president Andrew Wilson, consumers are tired of going out to retail stores to feed their gaming habit. Wilson told Eurogamer that gamers are becoming more comfortable with downloading or streaming games.

"There will come a day where I think that people will stop going into Game and GameStop. And I use those purely as examples of retail," said Wilson. "It's important for retailers and us to understand what the consumer wants in the future."

"The reality is what we're doing, which is very uncomfortable, which is putting the control in the hands of the consumer and letting them decide how they want to play," he added. "And when you do that it makes us all just a little bit nervous because as humans, in our DNA, we like to have control. Giving control to anyone - our parents, our teachers, our bosses, our kids - is scary. It's going to be a fun time."

Borders recently shut its doors because consumers have chosen online shops like Amazon to take care of their book-buying needs. The difference is GameStop has been preparing for this with diverse purchases like Impulse and Kongregate. Can it stave off the inevitable?